£23m building work backlog at Leeds hospitals trust

Katie Baldwin

tackling building work which poses a “significant risk” at Leeds hospitals would cost £23m – the highest of any NHS trust in Yorkshire.

The new figures, from the Health and Social Care Information Centre, show that eradicating the backlog of ‘risk’ structures would cost £23m.

Hospital bosses said this would include replacing equipment which is past its expected lifespan but still working well, as well as non-critical maintenance to older buildings.

But tackling the highest-risk work, which includes repairs which must be addressed urgently to prevent major disruption or safety issues, would cost £125,068 – less than in other Yorkshire NHS trusts.

The costs have been revealed two years after the Yorkshire Evening Post reported Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust had the largest overall building work backlog in the NHS, then standing at around £134m.

A spokesman said: “The trust has one of the largest and most varied estates in the NHS and this poses a significant challenge as we have many older buildings which are expensive to run and maintain and are increasingly unsuitable for patient care.

“Inevitably the result is we always have an ongoing amount of backlog maintenance, much of it linked to the age of the estate.

“We target the highest priority maintenance first every year.”

Some of the oldest parts of the trust’s estate, including buildings at Leeds General Infirmary and Seacroft Hospital, are to be sold off eventually as they are no longer suitable.

The spokesman added that the £23m backlog maintenance figure included work on buildings that they are now moving health care services out of.

“These buildings and others in the Trust – such as the old fever wards at Seacroft Hospital – are effectively surplus to requirements,” he added.

“Fortunately we do also have much newer building stock on all our sites and want to target investment in those buildings which most of our patients and staff use.”